Sunday, September 19, 2010

Labor Day Weekend Part 3- Dr. Fish

I have been wanting to go to a Dr. Fish spa, so we thought this weekend was a perfect time to try it out! Basically you stick your feet into a pool, and the fish eat the dead skin off them...this was just such a crazy thing we had to do it in Korea! I did not have great directions, but I knew it was near a Paris Croissant....which in Korea is basically like saying it's next to Starbucks, but we found it eventually! The Book and Spa Cafe!


The cafe was very unique and had a great atmosphere. The people who worked there did not speak English, so we used a lot of hand gestures :) But we walked in, and ordered tea and lemonade, a waffle, and Dr. Fish for 2. I thought it was awesome you just ordered it all at once. We sat down at a table, and figured out that they would come get us when it was our turn for the fishes. They brought us our drinks and we sat there eating the bread they offered at the self-serve bar and played cards for a while. Finally, it was our turn!
So we walk onto the platform and take off our shoes. Then we have to wash our feet in a sink on the floor....Now we're officially ready for this:
YIKES! We sat down, stuck our feet in the little fish filled pool, and looked like this!
The tickling was almost UNBEARABLE! We were laughing so hard and I was basically kicking the fish...not very effective for wanting them to be near you. After a while it wasn't as bad, and I managed to sit still long enough for them to start eating my feet. Matt was better at being still than I was, but they were even getting between his toes! I don't know how he stood it. But they also really loved his hands. For a while he was distracting all the fish with just one hand.



So there we are. We survived Dr. Fish. I don't think it actually made my feet smoother, but it was a neat experience and I'm glad we did it!

Friday, September 17, 2010

Labor Day Weekend Part 2- Aquarium

After we got rained out at the zoo, we headed over to the COEX Mall to see the aquarium. The COEX mall is a super center of malls. Huge is not even an accurate way to describe it. Needless to say, I had a ton of fun with it! We were simply impressed by the fact that they got a really big aquarium mostly underground. While there was some...different displays at the aquarium, we still had a great time!

The entrance to the aquarium was pretty neat.

The top 2 pictures are Dr. Fish, fish. They eat dead skin off of your body! Bottom left, Matt got excited because he found Nemo!

Sure, why not put fish in a toilet bowl and in a refrigerator? It's an aquarium, so I guess they can put fish wherever they want!

And sure, why not just throw in a random chipmunk and a bat display??

Despite all the randomness, the actual fish were pretty neat! They had HUGE manatees and even sharks!

Labor Day Weekend Part 1- Zoo

Over our supposed-to-be 4 day weekend, which turned into 2.5 day weekend, we went up to Seoul to do some Korean-y things. After I had forgotten my camera on Saturday, we ended up seeing Inception instead, and jamming all of our activities into Sunday. First we went to the zoo to try and avoid the heat and it was awesome! And gigantic! I was definitely tired of walking by the time we reached the opposite end of the park, but we had a great time hanging out with all the animals.
**I got a little collage happy on these, but I didn't want to post all the pictures separately :) **

This is the entrance to the Zoo, Matt and I with a giraffe, and the Dolphin Show!
My collage of cute Koreans. They are very different, but have their adorable moments :)
I love this man. He is such a goofy kid and makes the craziest faces, but he makes me laugh so much every day. Bottom left picture, notice Matt has fully adapted to the Asian way of life with the peace sign.
Some of the zoo animals!
Elephants are my favorite!
Top left is the entrance to Seoul Grand Park where the zoo is. The only pictures are when we took the lift back down cause I was tired of walking. Definitely over-priced and we got rained on, but there was definitely a great view!
And this is Korea. Nasty spiders EVERYWHERE. Gross.

Thursday, September 2, 2010

Around Gunsan

Last weekend Matt and I went on a date (yay!) and decided to do and see things around Gunsan. First I wanted to take some pictures of Gunsan city and show that it really can be pretty!

These are the rice fields just off the highway.

Rice fields edged by pepper plants!

So the Koreans are big on growing peppers and they like to dry them in the sun....


....so why not dry them on the streets!

Very strange, but they do it everywhere! Streets, sidewalks- basically anywhere they can throw down a tarp!


Then we went to eat dinner at Galbi (aka, Beef on a Leaf) and it was delicious- as always. After that we went to Baskin Robbins and got the ice cream and fruit fondue plate- yummy!
The dessert!

There was so much to eat!

But we managed to eat it all! Ya! :)

We went to Eunpa park to see the lit up bridge and fountain! It was very beautiful!

An elderly Korean asked if we wanted our picture taken...he was so funny while he took it! He tried to count in English 1,2,3 but his daughters had to help him :)

We thought we were just going to take the rest of the walk around the lake...but what we didn't know, was that to get back to our original place was about a 2+ mile walk. Not quite what we envisioned but it was still fun! The bridge from the other side of lake.

What every good park needs at the end- a stretching/workout machine!

The Koreans LOVE them!

Seoul Flower Market

A couple weekends ago, a few of us decided to take the trek to Seoul to visit the Flower Market. It's more like a gigantic complex of multiple buildings and underground tunnels. But the best part was the cut flower building where you can get all kinds of cut flowers for ridiculously cheap prices!

Inside the flower market!

The flowers smelled SO GOOD!

Cut flowers.

More cut flowers.

Katey and her adorable daughter Sophie!

We tried to get her to smell the flowers, not eat them.

Smelling more flowers!

She got so excited to stand under the flowers!

Claire carrying all of our spoils!

The lilies I bought opened up into these huge beautiful flowers! Some of the most beautiful lilies I've ever seen!

The lilies :)

Friday, August 6, 2010

288 Sq Feet of Fun!

So many people have asked what our shoebox of a room looks like, so I'm finally posting some pictures to show everyone! I also got curious to know how big our room actually is. Matt measured, and rounding up- 288 sq ft. That includes the bathroom, 'kitchen', and bedroom/livingroom/dining room combination we have. Ignore the mess and piles of stuff...with 2 people living in 288 sq ft there isn't a lot of storage space!

Our hallway!

Zed's room :)


Our living room/bedroom/dining room....



The table on the left is my "counter space" and check out those fabulous curtains! haha

View to our kitchen.

Kitchen! Those are all the plates, bowls and cups we have

Fridge! Basically an ode to Faith!

Bathroom. The first area is the sink/counter, the second is toilet and shower :)


And that's it! Our 288 sq ft of fun!